Donal Ryan
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No. Mikäs? Älä jumita. Hanki Freestartsin työvaatteet ja turvakengät. Niin työ käy kuin tanssi. Freestarts. Works everywhere. Hei, täällähän onkin vanhoja keksituttoja. Hauska nähdä. Ei olla. Mitä? Ei olla vanhoja tuttuja. Me ollaan uutuuskeksejä. No mistä ste tuutte sitten? S-Marketista. Elämä on ruokaa. S-Market.
Welcome to the programme where an author tells us about their new novel and reveals three other works that inspired its creation. Today, my guest in the studio is multi-award-winning Irish author Donald Ryan. Remarkably, Donald has never published a novel that hasn't made it to number one on the Irish bestsellers list. He's also won Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards no less than three times. Just last year, he won the 2025 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and he's twice been long-listed for the Booker Prize. According to another acclaimed Irish author, Sebastian Barry, who was on this very programme just last week, Donal is the king of the new wave of Irish writers. Quite appropriate given that his latest novel is called Where Are the Kings?
A story of a young boy coming of age in 1990s Ireland after the tragic loss of his mother. Donal Ryan, welcome to Take 4 Books. Thank you so much, Jimmy. Great to be here. Donald, you're here to talk about your new novel, Where Are the Kings, and the three works that influenced it. And you've picked two hugely influential novels about very difficult childhoods from the 1990s and the 2010s, Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes and Emma Donoghue's Room, and a beloved American bestseller about small town life in eastern Colorado. But before we get to those, Donald, let's start with that quote from Sebastian Barry, that you're the king of the new wave of Irish writers. Do you feel kingly?
Well, I was very kind of Sebastian to say that, and it's been a great blurb ever since. But he said it about 12 years ago, so I've definitely been overtaken a few times between then and now. So not really, no. We all just struggle to get the words down and get the books out and hope for the best, really, you know. Where are the Kings? It's
a book about a young boy who's just lost his mother. Just bring us into the circumstances of how the novel begins.
Well, Jack's mum takes her own life very early in the book. And Jack feels responsible. He feels that he should have saved her from doing this. And the book describes the next two years of Jack's life from 12 to 14.
And what about the title of this new novel, Where Are the Kings? That's taken from a play by W.B. Yeats, isn't it? And there's a famous scene where a character is so touched by grief and madness that he starts fighting the waves of the sea.
Yeah, it's just seemed apt, you know. Cú Chulainn is mad with grief and guilt and, you know, he's trying to fight back the tide because his son's body is there. He's killed his son by accident. And Jack's chase at the start of this book that ends in his failure to save his mum, you know, it seemed to have an echo in that. But actually I hadn't considered that connection when I decided to call the novel Where Are The Kings. I just loved that play and the end of it and the idea of people shouting Where Are The Kings to run down to the beach and it just seemed right. And also I had Theo and Holly, Jack's uncles in mind from the start before I even had the story fully formed that they would be there And they are definitely kingly.
You know, they're not regal in their bearing, but they're regal in the magnitude of the influence they have on Jack and the way they're there for him all the time and the kind of moral courage they have. Well,
tell us about this boy, Jack, who's at the heart of your novel. He's 12 years old when the book begins. He's in small-town Ireland in the 1990s. And he keeps reliving the last few moments of his mother's life, doesn't he, as he pedals after her on his bicycle.
Yeah, I mean, he feels a momentous weight of guilt because he feels that he should have saved her. He should have got there in time.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–4:54
2
What is Donal Ryan’s new novel *Where Are the Kings* about?
4:54–9:16
3
How does the novel open and what trauma does Jack experience?
9:16–11:50
4
Why did Ryan choose the title *Where Are the Kings* and what does it reference?
11:50–30:44